Charlotte Man Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison For Discharging A Firearm

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – On Tuesday, April 1, 2014, Chief U.S. District Judge Frank D. Whitney sentenced Gerald Wayne Hairston to serve 120 months in prison for a federal firearms violation, announced Anne M. Tompkins, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. Hairston, 30, of Charlotte, was also sentenced to five years of supervised release.

Wayne L. Dixie, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), Charlotte Field Division joins U.S. Attorney Tompkins in making today’s announcement.

According to court records and yesterday’s sentencing hearing, in April 2012, Hairston was a patron at a restaurant located on Pineville Mathews Road, in Pineville, N.C. Court records indicate that Hairston got into fight with at least one other patron at the restaurant. Following that fight, records show that Hairston retrieved a firearm from his car, pointed the gun at a group of patrons outside the restaurant and fired two to four shots. According to court records, Hairston then fled the scene and was later arrested by law enforcement. Officers found a Ruger, model P-5, 9 millimeter pistol with ammunition and drugs in Hairston’s car. Hairston pleaded guilty to one count of discharging a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime in May 2013.

Hairston has been in federal custody since January 2013. He will be transferred to the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons upon designation of a federal facility. All federal sentences are served without the possibility of parole.

The investigation was handled by ATF. The prosecution for the government was handled by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ann Claire Phillips of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Charlotte.